Project management in the construction industry can be really easier with the help of social media
Have you ever thought of using social media to improve the performance of your construction company? Is it possible to use social media in project management?
Nowadays, not only is social media used for communication and entertainment, but it also is playing an important role in business and marketing.
In this article, we’re going to let you know if social media can be used in project management, especially for construction managers.
Social media benefits
With more than 3.8 billion social users across the globe, social media is now king in communication and news.
Countless B2C companies are using it to increase their brand awareness and build an online identity. Recently, many B2B companies are also thinking about leveraging it to get ahead of the competition.
Social media marketing as a kind of unpaid activity using social media channels is the first priority of many marketing strategists. Of course, posting some simple images or videos on Facebook or LinkedIn can’t generate many leads for you because the competition is too hot now.
You might even need to use paid services to advertise your products on social media or promote your posts on different platforms.
Anyway, social media have many benefits for every business owner. Here are several advantages of using social media:
- It’s easy to use
- It’s way cheaper than traditional methods
- A huge audience reach
- More exact audience targeting
- Being measurable
Top social media platforms for construction professionals
As you know, every social channel has a different purpose and style. For example, Pinterest is of more interest to women, and more than 70% of its users are female. On the other hand, a social channel like Research Gate is focused on researches, and its users are mostly academics.
So it’s important to know what you’re looking for to choose the best platform. Now, the question is what social media channels are of more use to project managers.
Here are top platforms for construction professionals and project managers:
LinkedIn has over 760 million registered users, 260 million of which use the platform once each month.
LinkedIn is the most sought after social networking site among professionals, job seekers, and employers. More than 90% of construction professionals such as engineers, real estate agents, condo resale experts, students, and managers constantly use this platform to grow their network.
If you use this platform:
- You can easily connect with your community
- You can employ skillful team members
- You can market your brand
- You can share your experience and appear like a niche thought leader
So this is a must-use platform for every project manager in the construction industry.
The second best social media platform for project managers in the construction industry is Twitter because more than 84% of niche experts use it.
Twitter has more than 330 million monthly active users and 145 million daily active users. It is also useful for professionals to build a community and share their ideas.
Facebook is the largest platform in the world and has more than 2.5 billion monthly active users. It is used by more than 82% of professionals in the construction industry.
LinkedIn is ranked first on the list of most effective social networks for marketing, while Facebook is the least effective one. As you can see, the number of users is not necessarily insurance for success, and a targeted audience reach is much more important.
Tips for using social media in construction project management
Now that you have become familiar with social media benefits, it’s good to know how it can be of use in construction project management.
Here are several tips for you:
Manage communications
Communication is central to project management and consumes a great portion of your team’s time and effort.
Social platforms are the best means of 24×7 communication. It’s easy, cost-effective, and available. If you want to contact a person overseas using a phone call, you should pay a considerable amount of money. But, video/voice calls using messaging apps consume the internet, which is much cheaper.
Moreover, different types of content, such as text, pictures, voices, videos, live videos, hashtags, info-graphics, and stickers, can easily convey complex messages instantly. This is not achievable in traditional means of communication.
Using these platforms is a must for construction project managers to handle communications in their projects. Monitoring and recording the history of communications was a time-sucking task and subject to numerous unintentional errors. This task can easily be done using social media services to prevent future problems.
Communication via social applications is also way better than email because you can add several members and easily reply to any messages you want.
Manage remote works
Remote working has now become a trend as the new version of coronavirus is spreading around the world.
As you know, a significant number of tasks don’t necessarily need to be performed in the workplace. So you just need a laptop and a high-speed internet connection to do your job and let your boss know the results. This can be of great use to construction project managers to reduce expenses, avoid getting COVID-19, and increase efficiency.
Although the process of constructing the building finally needs a physical presence, you can’t assign many tasks to remote staff.
Social apps are very useful tools for managing remote tasks, setting online meetings, sending the results and reports, communications, and many other activities.
Manage project updates
Social media can help the construction project manager to instantly manage updates and assign every employee the right task.
Updates can be about project revisions, errors, time changes, team activities, new assignments, emergencies, etc.
Educate new employees
Lessons learned are short experiences you have after every project, and you can use them to improve the quality of your upcoming project.
Social media can be useful in managing lessons learned and educating new employees with the help of your experiences.
Having a certain social media channel for this purpose will help you increase your efficiency.
Boast about your achievements
As mentioned earlier, one of the most effective means of getting fame and building brand awareness is by using social media.
Using social media, you have the chance to inform your community of achievements in a project. This can be useful to prove your project management abilities to other experts and newcomers. That’s why many real estate managers are trying to use social escrow services to buy existing social media accounts related to real estate.
Final word
Project management in the construction industry can be really easier with the help of social media. Also, it lets you build an online brand identity and get the attention of investors and those who need project managers. That’s why many are trying to use social escrow services to have a high-following social media account.
